A VAMPIRE WHORE AND A DEAD FRENCH KNIGHT SPEAK THEIR MIND

this is minnie. I wanna tell you some more stuff about me and that headliner girl, the one who came into town to do a week at the 'troc,' the trocadero burlesque house where I worked. but some carriage trade type french fella is already blowin' his smoke all up in that wilkravitz guy's brain, so he ain't got no room for me right now. I would type this out myself, but I don't know shit about them buck rogers communicating machines. you know, them 'computer' gadgets. they gimme the heebie-geebies. all I have to do is just look at one and it's like I got worms in my oat meal or something. maybe I'll be able to smear you up with the rest of the tittie-lating story tomorrow? right now, I'm sitting on a bench near penn's landing, in center city, philadelphia, eyeballin' a bunch a drunk, outta-town tourists here for the fourth a july hoo-haa. one a them is startin' to look a little bit, lip-smackin' tasty. smells like liquid bacon, mixed with honey-glazed tavern ham. you know, human beings taste just like pig meat. that is a fact. go ahead, stop a cannibal on the street sometime (what, you think hannibal lechter is unique or something?) and ask him. you'll find out. oh, one more thing. you know all them fake ben franklins they got prancin' 'round this city for the tourists? well the one schmoozin' a bunch in from atlanta outside pat's steaks (cheese steaks) in south philly, is the real one. just in case you do not know what I am talkin' about, google (I do know some terms) vampirewonderland and the anti-enchantment-bureau. he looks pretty good for about three hundred and five years old too. and no, he ain't a vampire. we cover the whole waterfront, if you know what I mean. vampires (like me) are just part of the story. I am telling you...you gotta keep up. there's a year's worth of episodes and shit up here for you to read. actually, johnny jump up is my favorite. even I turn around and trot back the other way when I spot him. look, I gotta go. that 'ye olde knight,' frenchie-la-rue guy wants a talk.....

Is that vampire-whore wench done yet? Well, if you're hearing me, then I suppose she is. That Andalucian, Spanish Jew, Jonathon, or Tomas, or whatever he calls himself is off somewhere with his consort, Sarah. They are busy attempting to recruit others (vampires and the like) into their world-wide salvation scheme. I believe they're back with Renate (his vampiric grandmother) and an unexplainably resurrected John Lennon. I am told he enjoys showing off his bullet holes. Lucky he wasn't beheaded. that, could prove rather distasteful and to borrow from the present day jargon...would tend to turn most people off.

So you know that I entered Jerusalem as a vampire. Believe me when I say you can pick up more in the average caravanserai than just bedbugs. At first, the French and Italian forces used me much like a 'golem.'  Regular readers of this tale will be familiar with that word. So, at least, 'Jonathon' and I have that much in common. A bit later, after falling in with a certain high-born Muslim faction, I drifted into the service of S'allah-din himself. That's when I first became a slave  to the hookah. You know how we vampires covet fine aromas? And although most of my victims were drawn from the ranks of deserving, evil-doers, I was never-the-less quite willing to 'cull' the occasional spice, or inscense merchant when necessary. Later, as I became adept at creating 'familiars,' such excesses were no longer seemly, though the guilt still plagues me to this very night....Please excuse me...I must stop now....the drama of the Holy City commands it......Adieu...........

THIS IS THE (VAMPIRE) STORY A MINNIE THE MOOTCHER AND HOW SHE MET HER LADY FRIEND

OK, now I gotta be tellin you this stuff fast, cause I keep my distance from them other Philly vampires. Do they know I'm here? Who the hell cares. That Doctor Franklin sugar-daddy, down in that magic place under the ship yard knows. He knows lots of things. Even them other life-eaters don't know all the stuff he  knows. I do not mean 'Papa' and  them really old ones. They understand a lot. They grasp a lot. but even they do not know all the Philly dirt I know, like who been swappin' spits (and other juicy-juices) and what kinda slap-slap-tickle-tickle games  are even more popular than Monopoly in certain rarified circles. Shit, this town been the same since they voted in the Volsted Act. Don't mind my spellin'. Book learnin' ain't never been one a my priorities, less it's the Kama Sutra or one a them other sutras. I got the whole set. They was sellin' 'em down at the Trocadero. Used to 'butcher' 'em between acts. Do I think they actually got all that 'adult' educational information from the Hindu holy books? Hell, no. Some artistically preverted numbers writer down on Snyder Avenue used to bang 'em out on a little, old Underwood typewriter back of  Goldstein's candy store. I knew the wife...Well, the REAL wife, not the little Betty Boop korva, or putan (take your pick) he used to mush  up wiff. I knew the imitation Jean Harlow, foul mouthed, sticky bitch he was actually hitched to. She was nice. Used to send me a whole bunch a free 'goof butts.'   But then one day she ran out on the street in her brassier and panties actin' all crazy  and got hit by the trolley car. Looked just like the steak tar-tar at Frankie Bradley's, only wiff the bones still in it.  Crows and rats polished her off before the cops even got there.

What??? You wanna know who I am? Well, I don't want to say....OK, OK, OK, I'll tell  you this...Call me Minnie. If you are old enough, you may remember. I used to do this Minnie the Mootcher strip dance, third act up from the closer in the Burlesque . The Trocadero was a major stop on the 'pastie parade' back in those days, the '20's and '30's, I mean.  We worked for the house, filled the chorus, played 'tart' to the comics. New headliners came in every week. But I just stayed put. Times were tough and twenty dollars a week was good money. Hell, my clothes did not come from no push cart vendor. I shopped Lit Brothers' and Gimbels, I want you to know.

So how did I become a vampire? Who taught me the 'shadow shimmy'? Well, I can tell you that now, 'cause I hear she served as the base for a really good salsa. Seems she crossed some bad fellas down in Havana. Hey, Castro was a fanatic against vampires, especially vamperinas.So they diced her up, threw in some onions and celantro (a little bit a tomatoes too--- some a these fellas were originally from the Yucatan.) and ate her up on about nine hundred and sixteen Ritz Crackers. At least that's what I heard. Some in the Cuban underworld claim her blood wiped out almost every case a gangster clap on the island. A regular Carter's Little Liver Pills, she was.

Look, come by next time. I'll tell you how it all started. Aw, hell, who am I kiddin'? I'm gonna tell you a little right now. You ever see any of 'em old, black and white 'flip-books'? I am referring to the 'Two Gal Friends On The Road' series, or 'Steamy Nights in Old Lesbos". Still show up at flea markets now and then. Fetch big money too.  Well, I was the black haired one (dye) with the daintier tah-tahs....Could a parlayed that gig into the movies, only them unions don't take no vampires, the bigoted sons a bitches.... I gotta stop now. Gettin' angry makes he hungry. I know, I know, I know what them other vampires say----- It's not the blood, but the 'culling' of the unworthy life.....Yeah....Who cares what them friggin' bastards think....I am gonna go have me some liquid bacon....................

IF NOSTRODAMUS WROTE OF VAMPIRES, HE COULD NOT COME ANY CLOSER

This 'one' comes to you from far away and beyond many barriers. Those who normally enscribe this story take no part in what is to follow. My purpose is to draw back the curtain and show you things as they are.

Look to your place in the firmanent. Behold your situation. You inhabit not a planet, but a twin, binary system. That which you call 'the moon,' is a sister world, placed there by 'unknown hands,' so that you might be protected and saved from destruction.

Such arrangements are exceedingly rare, occuring only in the most pivotal cosmic nurseries. That is what the Earth truly is, a place of creation and innovation, set apart from the chaotic malestrom of the galaxy so that you might live.

Is it 'humanity' that you call yourselves? Then I will do the same. Humanity is brought forth via careful, measured steps. The land masses of your world were shaped and seperated so that you should travel to them and encounter new peoples.

The oceans churning between your rocky isles mirror the vastness of space, but you crossed them, in psychic preparation of greater journeys to come. First to the Moon (a baby step). Then to the red, fossilized realm you call Mars.

Echoes of life will be found therein. Indeed weak, surviving vestiges of once what was are already waiting for the first 'hello.' And as I scan the records of this 'blog,' as you call it, this 'vampirewonderland,' I find reference to the manta-ray-like beings of Europa, an ice crusted, water world keeping company with Jove.

See? Jove (Jupiter), already provides you with a 'toy,' nearby 'star system' to gird you for the real thing. It has all been spelled out for you. The path is cleared, your futrure forged.

Open your eyes...See what surrounds you.......What surrounds you is real.....Embrace that reality.......Reality is truth........................................Yet I think you've heard this all before, inscribed in an ancient tongue.......Scotosh beedosh......Beedosh boposht.....Boposht sceedosh.......

It is so difficult to render an accurate translation, especially  for one such as I, who has never had a tongue. But I try....and so should you. Those you call vampires are merely humans stained with the tincture of another realm, seperate from yours, but oh, so very close......Listen to them...Follow them...And learn..............

A CIRCASSIAN, FEMININE PLAYTHING HAS HIDDEN POWERS

Jean-Michel continued with his story. He told of sailing from the fabled 'shores' of La Serenissima (The Noble Republic of Venice). He told of pirating their way across the Mediterranean and preying on Saracen ships, till they dropped anchor somewhere on the south coast of Anatolia. They camped on a desolate shore, living off tough, rubbery mollusks and brackish water from a nearby tidal river. Any peasants dumb enough to approach were slaughtered on the spot, even their own co-religionists, for Eastern Rite Christians were still somewhat common in the region. The supply vessels caught up with them after a few days, allowing the ego-ridden marauders to become 'gentlemen' knights once more. True, some of the mounts died during the voyage, but replacements were easily snatched from a sleepy, unsuspecting Seljuk fortress a bit inland.  Remember, this is the First Crusade we're talking about. Things became increasingly more difficult with each succeeding holy war. The Army of True Believers closed ranks, formed columns, blew trumpets and headed east, killing all Muslims, Jews and 'Greek' Christians in their path. Jean-Michel was having a really nice time. The sky was blue. The sea was green. The blood was red. His saddle bag grew heavy with the jewels and trinkets of  brutally slaughtered infidels. After a time, even the necessary raping became quite tiresome, so they made a game of it, one tally mark for the usual dusky local and two tally marks for  any alabaster skinned, carrot topped 'Circassians' encountered along the way. Ethiopes and 'Maidens of Cathay' (an extremely rare commodity in these parts) earned three tally marks. Needless to say, our Burgundian gallant did very well.

But one night, after a hard day of ceaseless slaughter, as he settled down in the open courtyard of a commandeered caravanserai, our medieval Frenchman was tossed a different type of feminine plaything. She appeared to be a Circassian and maybe she was. That is not the important thing, for she was also a blood-drinker, newly made and as yet unsure of her powers. So there beneath a blue-black sky, brushed with the huge, frightening arc of The Milky Way, our soldier of Christ found himself enlisted in yet another army........ And he entered Jerusalem a 'changed' man........

THE VAMPIRE JEAN - MICHEL SPEAKS

Jonathon was wary of this new individual. Why should he be tolerant of an everlasting Crusader, one of a band responsible for the destruction or dispersal of his mortal family? Even Papa, his vampiric initiator, suffered at their hands. So he sat back and let the French-brigand-'aristocrat' talk.

The Burgundian knight sensed his tablemate's distrust. He understood all the reasons, but being a practical 'man,' trained in warfare, he continued to push on. Sarah studied the strong features and short, sandy hair, attempting to learn something of the person within. She had trouble following his revelations, since most of what he said was in  Arabic, or Hebrew (1,000 years in Jersusalem works it's magic), but this emotionally fine-tuned vampirina didn't really need language. Her dialogues took place on a more visceral level.

Jean-Michel exhaled. His breath smelled of coffee, odd for a vampire, unless he'd been smoking some mocha flavored tobacco? They can smoke...Vampires, I mean. After all, we know how much they enjoy aromas. The humans in the late-night cafe seemed to receed into the ether, as he began to share his story.

My name is Jean-Michel ---he said. I was born into a clan of petty, though ambitious land owners in a remote area far from the newborn cultural center of Paris. Indeed, we had more truck with the German towns to the east and the Italian merchantile capitols farther south than with the supposed heartland of our nation. My father 'owned' twelvehundred souls, serfs, I mean. They toiled in the fields and paid taxes so that we could live well-fed lives behind  stout, stone walls, dining on fire-roasted joints of fat, dripping meat ...Do you know that during the brutal winters we used to rub that fat into our grimy skins to keep them from cracking open? Cold will do that, you know. I lost two young brothers to infected, festering 'winter tears" we used to call them. Like knife cuts, they were...No, worse, like paper cuts...But think not that we had anything as fine as paper. Such luxuries were unknown to us. But we did have fine horses to ride and falcons for the hunt and heavy breasted serf wenches to mount when we got tired of the horses.

Yet all of this would never pass to me. I was only a second son, meant to toady up to an even richer land owner, who would enlist me in his service and take me on his quests, so that  I might  fatten my own purse on his leavings......So that is what I did. We killed neighboring chevaliers, struggling barons, prosperous farmers and other small householders (quite different than serfs), not to mention the usual measure of Jews. Believe me, it pleasures me not to tell you this, but my sword first tasted blood from the breast bone of a young Jewish boy. What did he do? He was there. He was first. He was near at hand. I was eager to practice a 'blood eagle,' taught to me by Norman mercenaries from the west. They knew it from their Viking grandfathers...rip open the chest, hoist out the red, wet lungs, heave them over the victim's shoulders and laugh, as he choked and died in blood-soaked agony. Seeing as there was a fair number of Jews in some of the towns nearby, I 'd get lots of practice. No one cared when the victims were Jews. Now remember, Crusader fever was in the land. Flea-bitten friars goaded the populace into action. They spoke with the authority of The Church. Who were we to differ? True, some of the more educated bishops disdained such excess...though not the booty thus produced. After a time, I had my mount, a fine, gray stallion and the necessary armor and weaponry to go with it. I picked up a squire or two, little more than slaves, actually. And, in my case, we joined forces with a bevy of rich, well connected counts in Venice, where we commandeered that city's fleet and set sail for The Holy Land.......God's work would be done........

Yet before he could continue, some Israeli police stormed in and ordered everyone out, as they grabbed a couple of suspected bomb makers and spirited them away. Other uniformed personel questioned everyone out on the street. Our three life-eaters made 'vampire eyes' at them  and so were not molested or detained. But dawn was beginning to trickle into the skies of Zion. The time for vampires to be out and about was over...at least for now.....  

THE VAMPIRE JEAN-MICHEL...A CRUSADER KNIGHT IN JERUSALEM

Things move slowly in Jerusalem. Discussions drag on night after night after night. Jonathon and Sarah coast through the city, visiting a sundry assortment of well known religious shrines and sights.He is much taken by the ruins of Herod's Temple, known to Earth as 'The Weatern Wall.' Jonathon's people were of the hereditary priestly class. Think of the individuals who used to reign as 'prince bishops' in feudal holdings throughout the Hapsburg Empire and you'll get the idea,.They had seats in The Great Sanhedrin (the 'senate' of Jerusalem) and contributed towards the shaping of Western Religious Thought, as we know it. Indeed, some in the Fourth Commonwealth (as the land of Israel is sometimes known today) call for the re-establishment of that august assemblage, as precursor to a resurrected monarchy. But I digress. Another vampire walks the Holy City. His name is Jean-Michel, a French knight left over  from those ill-fated medieval Trinitartian attempts to wrest control of the See of Abraham from the various Unitarian factions known in the area.

Sarah spotted him, as he strolled through a night market festooned with 'bee' lights in the Old City. Did he glow? No. Was he deathly pale? No. Was there somethinng strange and magical about his person? That woulld be difficult to say. Enchantment often rests in the eye of the beholder. But he had a certain mien, a physical gravity, a warrior's grace and she saw that. She squeezed Jonathon's hand and said - Look......He followed her gaze and smiled......A vampire, that one is - he whispered.....One thousand years of darkness tend to fine tune the senses. Jonathon  was never wrong. He sent out a thought pulse and the Frenchman (or more correctly, the Burgundian) caught it, nodding in their direction. Jonathon gestured toward a nearby coffee bar. He led Sarah in. They found seats 'round a small table in the shadows and after a suitable measure of heartbeats, the Gallic life-eater joined them.

No one spoke. Communication took place via the subtle pre-linguistic telepathy vampires often use. There was no danger. There was no threat. So they sat there studying each other. Jonathon wore blue jeans, a tee shirt and thick, leather sandals. Sarah wore a short, sleeveless, ivory linen dress. Jean-Michel sported well cut khaki slacks, a gauzy white cotton shirt and fine, soft, kidskin driving shoes. Jonathon admired the stylish footwear. We all know how much he likes his  own collection of hand tooled black, leather bootkins.

The knight spoke first. He said - Please allow me to introduce myself. I am Jean-Michel, Chevalier du Roc-Montiel. My father was a count, but I am only a seconnd son, hence my place in the Crusades. New lands, conquests, glittering booty. I'm sure you understand.........Jonathon did understand, only too well. For it was a band of blood thirsty Crusaders who attempted to burn him, all those many long years ago. So he stopped and collected his thoughts before making a reply.............

PLAYING VAMPIRE POKER IN ATLANTIC CITY

Baylah, our Beyonce look alike, poker playing vampirina, invited me to go stay at her rich boyfriend's exceptionally fine beach house with the two of them. For a while, they were laying low, bunking at hotel suites and the like. But human beans are dumb. They refuse to see what they know they see. Could a stayed at the hotels, but they didn't.  So they're back at the big place in Margate. Lemme tell ya, I could get used to this. You can't die from designer sheets, natural slate, multi-head shower stalls and 3D flat screen TV's. Central airconditioning that actually works is good too. I  go out for pancakes every morning (if you can agree that under certain circumstances 1:30 pm is morning). And they let me pilfer a Benjamin or two from the Ming Dynasty money jar in the 'granite-with-a-vengence'  kitchen. Baylah, naturally, sleeps during the day in an opulent, little nest he had them build down the basement. You know the bottle 'I Dream of Jeannie' lived in? Well, it's like that.

The rich guy boyfriend has a white Bentley. It's all over town. Maybe you seen it?. Sometimes we scoot over to the marina back on Amherst Avenue and take the boat out. It's a classic, Penn Yan 58 foot sedan cruiser, in mint condition too, all decorated in teak, navy blue duck cloth, white piping, subtle touches of polished brass, accented with the occasional yellow throw pillow just to make things 'pop.'

They let you dock your boats at the big Bayfront casinos (Harrah's, The Golden Nugget, The Borgota), so that's how we roll. Baylah heads straight to the poker room. The rich boyfriend likes no limit blackjack. They usually toss me a few black chips, maybe fifteen hundred dollars worth. I cash 'em in and plant myself in front of a 'joler poker' video machine. I find the experience positively mesmerizing. You don't have to eat or urinate or nothing when them digital kings and queens start flippin' 'round.

Later on we meet for an early morning supper in one of the gourmet places where they force-feed the high rollers, almost as bad as they do them geese in France. Baylah likes looking at all the people, smelling all the smells and smiling at strangers. Sometimes she'll pick out a 'deserving' soul or two (evil doers) and have a bite herself when we're done.

But she still got a little of 'the call' in her. She still do her duty. I went with her once. You know those poor people who camp under the Boardwalk? She goes to them, dispensing  these little bottles of booze they used to pass out on the airlines. Only each one has a drop or two of her restorative blood swirled in. She helps a lot of folks. She cures sickness. Sometimes the miraculous blood even makes 'em think straight. You know, it's all part of that vampire 'preserve the worthy' thing. She knows what Jonathon and Sarah are trying to do. But her ways are a little different. No mass movements for her. 'Brighten the Corner where You Are' - that's what she thinks. The night I was there, she helped two queens (homeless transvestites....always dear to her heart)...and three Jacks (young, pathetic winos). That's a full house in my book....I'll let you know when she gets a royal flush.........This is wilkravitz saying 'good night everyone.' And 'May you never know pain. May you never know fear. May you hide from death now and for forever.' ..... (a vampire blessing)